


Any Given Monday

by eriah211



Category: Primeval
Genre: Blood and Injury, Gen, Smilodon, Team, Team Dynamics, Women Being Awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-17
Updated: 2017-03-17
Packaged: 2018-10-06 19:24:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10342944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eriah211/pseuds/eriah211
Summary: Lorraine had a bad day at the office. They all did.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on livejournal in 2014.  
> Written for the primeval_denial Art Prompt Challenge 2014 (inspired by lonely_candle's art). Also a lot of thanks to fredbassett for the beta. Any remaining mistakes are all mine.

When Lorraine got home it wasn’t that late. On some days work had kept her in the ARC until it was so late that driving home only to come back a few hours later almost seemed like a waste of time. It hadn’t been one of those days, but she wouldn’t hesitate to change the last few hours for one day of never-ending paperwork and scheduling. That would have been simpler; tiring, but simpler, and it wouldn’t have ended up with her favourite jacket in the rubbish bin because of the blood stains.  
  
She dropped into the armchair in the living-room, let her bag slide to the floor and took off her shoes carelessly. Then she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she opened them again, she noticed for the first time the blood that was covering her shoes. They were so soaked she doubted there was a way to clean them, they were totally ruined.  
  
She looked out of the window and focussed on the peaceful sight of the sunset.  It was beautiful indeed, but not enough to distract her for long. She tried reading a book, like she did some days when she arrived home early, but it was useless. After staring at the same page for about fifteen minutes, she decided a hot shower would probably be the best option.  
  
The hot water helped to relax her muscles so she stayed there a long time, cleaning herself meticulously while trying to keep her mind as blank as possible.  And it worked for a while, but it was a lost battle, there was no way to keep the events of the day off her mind so she finally gave up and got out of the shower. She wrapped herself in her soft bathrobe and lay on the bed and then let her thoughts run free.  


 

 

***

  
  
It had been a hectic month and there were loads of things to do. The Prime Minister was being a pain in Lester’s arse, even more than usual, and that always meant more work for the office staff and more yelling in general, but especially for the field team. Fortunately for all, Captain Ryan seemed to be more than capable of coping stoically with Lester’s irritation. Professor Cutter on the other hand... she had to work hard with Jenny to avoid a catastrophe by keeping Lester and Cutter away from each other during the worst days.  
  
It was tricky and sometimes ridiculous, like the time Jenny had to fake a sprained ankle and cling to Cutter like a damsel in distress to make him miss a lift because Lester, in a particularly bad mood, had just entered it. Later they had laughed about it over some drinks and Lorraine had teased Jenny about her comedy skills, but the truth was that it was a very stressful time for all of them. That’s probably why nobody was paying too much attention to little details on those days, like the fact that the coffee machine in the kitchen of the lower floor didn’t seem to work very well.  
  
It looked like that had been the start of the fire, some random short circuit caused by an old machine, the fire-fighters said later. Unfortunately for all, it happened when nobody was around and the flames spread freely, but that hadn’t been the problem, because the fire alarm worked perfectly and soon it was heard in every corner of the ARC. That had been the real problem.  
  
The fire wasn’t too big or uncontrollable, everybody was warned and trained to follow the evacuation plan, but nobody had thought that the alarm was going to sound in the exact moment a supposedly sedated creature was being transported into its cell in the menagerie. Maybe they hadn’t calculated correctly how much sedative they would need or maybe the noise had been just loud enough to stir the creature up, but the fact was that the smilodon had broken free and caught everybody by surprise.  
  
Lorraine had been in Lester’s office when the alarm started sounding. She followed Lester outside and from the rail of the walkway they saw that the staff were slowly starting the evacuation of the building, but then the screams began. It was obvious to anybody that a fire didn’t make people scream like that and everybody knew which way the terrified sounds were coming from. In a heartbeat the calm evacuation was totally forgotten and the SF team ran towards the menagerie, Professor Cutter and Stephen Hart not far behind.  
  
Lester immediately ordered the rest of the staff to evacuate the ARC fast, but, unsurprisingly, Abby and Connor didn’t think the orders applied to them since they just ignored him and followed the sound of the screams. Lester muttered something about stupid misfits trying to get killed, but Lorraine knew he was as worried as she was.  
  
They didn’t have to worry about them for too long, though, because the smilodon seemed to know it was getting into a fight it couldn’t win and was trying to find a way out. Unfortunately for them it chose to get away from the men with the guns by running up the walkway, straight to them. Lester reacted fast, throwing Lorraine and himself to the floor, and she felt the creature bump into them, but fortunately it didn’t stop or pay any attention to them. The workers that were crowded in the corridor behind them, though, didn’t have the same luck. They were standing in the way of the smilodon and by the sound of the screams Lorraine heard while she was still on the floor, not all of them had managed to get out or hide in time.  
  
Lorraine felt more than saw the soldiers rushing after the creature and when she finally managed to get up she noticed the blood on her jacket, but she was pretty sure she wasn’t injured. After a moment of confusion she saw the blood pouring from Lester’s arm and gasped. Professor Cutter was already kneeling next to Lester to check the claw marks on his arm while shots and screams were echoing in the corridor, but he just stayed long enough to tell him to keep pressure on the injury to stop the bleeding and then he was gone. It certainly didn’t look too serious, but it was bleeding profusely and Lorraine helped him to cover it with her own jacket.  
  
The shots stopped suddenly and Lorraine knew it was over. As she was told later, they had finally managed to corner the smilodon in an office with no way out and soon Stephen had sedated it with a very strong dose before somebody decided to take more drastic measures. Then it was time to check the damage.  
  
The medics were by Lester’s side in a moment, as was Captain Ryan, who wore a worried expression on his face. Lester sent them all away almost immediately, claiming they were bound to be needed somewhere else and Lorraine had to hide a proud smile. Nobody would dare to say that her boss was just a pen-pusher. She stood up and saw that the fire-fighters had just arrived and were running towards the kitchen and she decided to follow the medical team into the corridor to help. Not that she had any specific medical training, aside from a basic first aid course, but she had never been able to stay still and do nothing. It took her a moment, though, to gather the courage to walk through the bloody corridor.  
  
At first she saw so much blood that she feared there had been a massacre, but in the end most of the people were just injured, in varying degrees of severity. It looked like the smilodon had been more worried about getting away than about killing and they were grateful for that, because it could have been so much worse.  
  
In the first office she checked Lorraine found one of the lab workers, a nice girl called Annie, and sat with her.  She had tripped and fallen during the chaos, while trying to run away from the creature, and she had banged her head against something. She had an ugly gash on her forehead, but she was conscious and coherent so Lorraine just tried to stop the bleeding and keep her calm until the medical staff finished with the more seriously injured.  When a doctor finally came to check on Annie, Lorraine looked for somebody else who needed her help.  
  
The fire-fighters were the first ones to go, after they had put out the fire and thoroughly checked the place. A few hours later, when everybody who needed it had been sent to the hospital and all the dead bodies had been removed, Lester told her to go home.

  
“We will have plenty of things to do tomorrow, there is no need for all of us to get stuck here,” Lester said.  
  
His arm was bandaged and held in a sling, but he had refused to go home until ‘everything was settled’, ignoring Jenny’s advice and Captain Ryan’s disapproving stares. Lorraine saw him go back to his office and Jenny sighed and followed him, but not before turning to send a knowing look at Ryan. Lorraine knew her friend well enough to know that Jenny and the Captain had probably a plan to get Lester out of there soon, no matter what he might say. Relieved, Lorraine took her bag, threw her blood stained jacket in the nearest bin and headed for the car park.  


 

 

***

  
  
Lorraine was surprised when she woke up the next morning, she hadn’t thought she was going to be able to sleep, but it looked like she finally had, at least for a while. She was having breakfast when a messenger brought her a package from the ARC and inside she found a wonderful and expensive blue jacket, just her size. She smiled fondly and made a mental note to thank Lester for the nice gesture. She finished her breakfast and got ready to go to work.  
  
Before going out, she looked at her reflection in the mirror of the hall and took a deep breath. She knew it was going to be a hard day, although surely not as bad as the previous one. But that something isn’t easy doesn’t mean it’s not worth it, she reminded herself. Then she took the keys of her car and went out the door.

 

-END-


End file.
